Pho Dreams — Restaurant in El Segundo

A bit of my background b4 I tear into this review: I am ethnic Vietnamese & grew up (from Saigon all the way to the USA) eating from the best to the not-so-delicious Vietnamese food. A typical VM resto is almost always graded on the taste & authenticity of our staple dish -- rice noodle soup with beef (we'll abbreviate it as "RNS"). The ingredients are very basic...rice noodles, beef (variety of what you want to eat from thinly sliced beef to all kinds of beef parts such as tendons, tripes etc.), & raw vegetables to add at will. And last but not least...the broth which is added hot just before serving it! Once the bowl is in front of me I normally would catch a whiff of the steamimg broth before beginning to sample it as it has a particular pleasant smell & taste that define its authenticity, in short the broth makes or breaks this VM national dish.

Typically a VM customer will often not make a 2nd visit to the resto whose RNS doesn't taste authentic. That being said, I will not revisit Pho Dreams! The broth tasted bland at best! My taste buds were crying out for the familiarity they had grown to know from a delicious beef broth...they got none! The 2 kinds of meat I ordered were raw beef slices & tendons; I literally had to dig for the few tiny pieces of tendons. Tendons are not expensive so a typical resto would spoil you with a good amount; not at Pho Dreams apparently!

I was hungry...yet I struggled to finish the bowl, but had to because I didn't want to waste any more of my time arguing about a bad meal & leave. I also ordered some summer rolls with pork & shrimps...I'm not even gonna bother reviewing this abysmal appetizer! The large bowl was $10...definitely overpriced for such a subpar dish! Same goes for the rolls that cost $6. This review will serve as my displeasure & disappointment. This resto being located in el Segundo is a saving grace for its business because it would not survive long in...

For a last-minute pick, this restaurant did not disappoint! I usually research places beforehand but didn't get to do so for this spot. The parking situation isn't great. If you grab a spot right in front (parallel parking), you're in luck.

(Side note: The people in this area don't seem very welcoming but that has nothing to do with this restaurant. I just had to point that out. We were stared at and not in a nice way.)

As for food, my friend and I ordered brisket pho while my other friend ordered the chicken wonton soup (not pictured). The pho was delicious, though the portion was smaller than expected in my personal experience. My friend who ordered the chicken wonton soup enjoyed her pick. This was the first time she had eaten this kind of food and she raved about it to me later. My husband ordered a breakfast-type meal and he surprisingly loved it (he's very particular about food and he has never eaten something like this). The presentation is 10/10 and the bread was everyone's favorite. It was super fresh and the crispness was perfect. Everything came out to less than $90. For 4 people, that is affordable (in my opinion). The ladies were very sweet and you could tell they take pride in their business. As I told them before I left, we will...

I love Pho but My first experience in this restaurant was Horrible. Before I walked in, it was super slow like there was no customer at the restaurant. When I about to order, the server has a bad broken English that hard to order and it was bit uncomfortable to talk to. I ordered the rare steak pho with egg rolls and plate of sliced onion. The taste was horrible. Only good was the ice water and plate of sliced onions that I also put Sriracha all over. Because the pho was super water down that has no flavor plus it has a sweet bad after taste. It was very blend with so much oil. I even drenched the Sriracha and Hoisin sauce to over come the taste but it still the worst. They put so much grease of oils that it over laps my tongue. I had to drink so much water to wash it down. The egg rolls was the worst than their pho. It tasted like microwave frozen eggrolls from 99 cents store. Super low quality and the taste was so bad that after one bite was enough. Everything was so bad and so horrible that I couldn’t finish the meal, I had so much leftovers. Not worth paying over $20 for this meal. No wonder they have no costumers. I will not...